Success in the small shop

SYNOPSIS — The profits of any shop are made on what comes in and goes out of its doors. If the class of work that comes to it is not suitable, the chances for profit disappear before they really begin. Considerable thought may well be given to the profitable selection of work both in the small specialty shop and in the small jobbing or general shop.

Here is an epitaph that might suitably be written over the common grave of many shops that have passed away: They bit off more than they could chew Shop indigestion, which comes from a badly selected diet, often results fatally. To guard against this it behooves the small shop to be very particular about the work that enters its door.

The complaint is sometimes heard that the small shop must take whatever it can get and that it gets what the big shop leaves. This is a somewhat indefinite statement, even if true, as it does not tell if what is left is good or bad. As a matter of fact, all shops select the work that they do, either consciously or unconsciously; and it is my purpose to show how this selection may be studied with a view to increasing profits.

The little specialty shop illustrates the importance of this better than any other, because it does not have the variety of work going on all the time that we find in a jobbing shop. Actions are here reduced to their lowest terms, and it is not difficult to see how the selection of work affects a shop of this kind.

Jones had one of these shops up in Massachusetts. I put this in the past tense because Jones himself is now back at his former job in a large machine-tool shop in Worcester. A friend of his invented a wrench; a very ingenious and original affair, and secured a document from Uncle Sam, giving him the right to sue anyone else that made it. Jones took his money out of the savings bank, mortgaged his home, fitted up a shop and started to manufacture the wrench on millers and a royalty. Both he and his inventive friend had great expectations, for the wrench was quite different from anything else under the sun. They failed to take two things into ac- count, however ; one, that half of the small shops in New England appear to be making patented wrenches; and the other, that the average purchaser does not buy a wrench because it is ingenious and original, but because it will grab a nut and doesn't cost much. It was a case of poor selection, and one bad choice was enough to wipe out the savings of many years and to put Jones back at the bench for life.

A clear and unbiased mind is necessary to make this important selection, as the inducement of a low cost and apparently large profits will often make one close his eyes to defects in real usefulness! or proper design. This was the case in a small incorporated specialty shop in the Central States, which had earned a good return on the money actually invested by manufacturing a patented automobile accessory.

The article, as it had been made, depended more for its popularity and usefulness on good design and construction than upon the value of the patented features; something that is not at all uncommon with patented devices. All went well until the old shop foreman left to take a better job and a new one arrived. This man, not seeing much chance to make a showing by reducing the cost of article as it had been made, set about to see what he could do by changing designs and materials. As a result of his efforts, something "just as good" at a much lower cost was exhibited; still retaining the patented features. The Board of Directors ordered 100 of these put out for a six months' trial, but the possibility of doubling profits so easily had a strong influence on their judgment, and made them ready to find excuses for the few that did not prove satisfactory. Inside of a year they were making the "improved" type exclusively. At the end of another six months they were wishing that they had never seen it.

Those of the hundred sent out for trial which had proven unsatisfactory were really the only ones that had been thoroughly tested out. This experience, which would have been a fatal one in a plant that did not have plenty of money back of it, was due to a poor selection caused by the tempting influence of excessive profits.


Can a Jobbing Shop Select Its Work?

Thus far, we have been speaking only of specialty shops, and it is quite evident that with them the selection of work is of vital importance. When it comes to the small jobbing shop, it is a little more difficult to see where its busy proprietor can take time to select the work or how he can afford to exercise selection at all. Consciously or unconsciously, however, all small shops pass the work that
they do through a very fine screen.

A broad selection of work is made in the first place by the geographical location of the shop, influenced by the nature of the industries in the surrounding country. An oil-field shop in Texas or California by its location, eliminates the likelihood of getting repair work on textile machinery, and the shop in Massachusetts is equally barred from fixing up disabled reapers or harvesters. Even the physical location of a shop within a restricted district has its effect on the class of work that it will
handle. The former is usually an unconscious or "can't be helped selection ; the latter is more often chosen with a view to the work that is to be done.


Some Factors That Influence the Choice of Work

The size of the plant and its physical arrangements have a great deal to do with its selection of work, although in the lumber regions one may occasionally see a logging locomotive being overhauled outside of a machine shop not much larger than the engine cab! But in general, the class of work that may be handled profitably is restricted to that which can be gotten through the shop door, and which can be carried away after it is finished.

The available supply of cash is an important factor in dictating the selection of work. It tells very plainly how big a job may be attempted within a given period, just as the size of a reservoir supply pipe limits the quickness with which it may be filled with water.

Equipment helps to make the selection of work by having something important to say about the size and quality of the parts that may be machined upon it. But by far the greatest limiting factor is the personal ability or the sum total of the skill and knowledge of those who are employed in the plant. This is really what does the work, whether it be the kind that is selected or that is thrust upon the shop. And this is the deciding factor in determining competition. If you wish to prove this statement, advertise for a man capable of digging ditches and for another capable of designing bridges, and you will have a striking illustration of how skill and knowledge eliminate competition.

All of the other factors, such as capital, location, building, and equipment, weigh but lightly as compared with ability.

The profitable selection of work means choosing it in accordance with the limitations of all of these factors, and of avoiding that which capital, location, plant, equipment or ability are not properly fitted to handle. Upon this selection depends the future success of the shop, and the more conscientiously and carefully this is done the greater will be its chances for success.

Using the Sieve

The first step toward making use of this is to determine as nearly as possible what the limitations are. Start in with the ability part first, as it is the most important. Map out the half dozen things that the combined ability in the little plant will enable- it to do better than the Jones Jobbing Shop, or the other shops in the neighborhood. Then take the question of equipment. Is it of proper nature, and in a proper condition to take care of the half-dozen things that ability fits the shop to do best?

Someone may object that he gets a job which fills all of these conditions but four or five times a year. In that case it is only four or five times a year that he is making his maximum possible profit. And more of this will depend either on getting these jobs more frequently, or of developing the five factors so that more things lie in this profitable field. In itself this analysis will be of value, for it will reveal where some of the factors are working at cross-purposes, and show what effort must be made to get them all pulling together in the same direction as ability.


Don't Starve in the Meantime

Doing the kind of work that it will be profitable to select does not mean turning away everything else that comes to the door and starving to death in the mean- time. The selection of a profitable line of work is something that may be made far in advance of its fulfillment, just as a youth chooses the profession of medicine long before he is qualified to prescribe pills. In making this choice he has placed a goal ahead of him which his ambition will urge him to reach, and most surely he would never be a physician if he had not previously determined to become one. And the small shop will never get into the line of work which is most profitable for it if it does not go through this process of analysis and hold out the result of it as a goal for future attainment.


Combination Jobbing and Specialty Shops

Oftentimes one will find a jobbing shop devoting a part of its efforts to making a specialty. This may be the least considerable part of its business at first, although not the least important, for if it is properly chosen and pushed, less and less time will be given to odd jobs and more and more to the specialty, until the demand for a product that is right has eliminated the odd jobs altogether and transformed the jobbing shop into a real manufacturing plant.

The selection of a profitable line is not sufficient in itself, any more than it is sufficient for an angler to say, will catch such and such a fish." It is quite necessary for him to go out with bait and tackle and coax the fish away from its accustomed haunts, and it is equally necessary for the small-shop manager to be as diligent in coaxing the desirable line of work into his doors. The public may make a road through the woods to the home of some man who builds the best mouse trap, but they will find him more quickly and come in larger numbers if he puts up a wireless outfit and makes known his location and what he makes.


Searching the Field

Time was when the village grocer took what business drifted into his door without question and was glad to get it. Nowadays, he makes an analysis of the number of families within the radius of his delivery, figures out how much each of them should purchase per week in his line, and then sets aside a certain portion of this as the share that he is going to get. The small-shop owner who wishes to extend his business on profitable lines will study the possibilities of his market with the greatest care. The small-repair-shop owner will know the location of every considerable piece of equipment in his line within a radius of from five to twenty-five miles, depending on his ambition and the thickness of population. The man who builds experimental and model machines will make it a point to know the names of all the patent-office patrons who live in his vicinity, each of whom is a potential customer, and he will also make sure that each of these individuals know his name and has a good idea of what he is able to do.

The selection of work in the small shop is just as important to its ultimate .success as a man's choice of a career. In either case when successful it really crystallizes into specializing at what one is best able to do. But the fact that a shop has started life without a very definite ambition and is doing work that does not bring much profit should not discourage its owner. A shop doesn't get old as quickly as a man, and many successful men have spent half of their lives just groping about for the right way.

It's never too late to begin!